Tropical Cyclones Feed More Heavy Rain in a Warmer Climate
The possible linkage of tropical cyclones (TC) to global warming is a hotly debated scientific topic, with immense societal impacts. Most of the debate has been focused on the issue of uncertainty in the use of non-research quality data for long-term trend analyses, especially with regard to TC inte...
Main Authors: | , , |
---|---|
Language: | unknown |
Published: |
2007
|
Subjects: | |
Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/2060/20080039570 |
id |
ftnasantrs:oai:casi.ntrs.nasa.gov:20080039570 |
---|---|
record_format |
openpolar |
spelling |
ftnasantrs:oai:casi.ntrs.nasa.gov:20080039570 2023-05-15T17:36:34+02:00 Tropical Cyclones Feed More Heavy Rain in a Warmer Climate Zhou, Y. P. Lau, K.-M. Wu, H.-T. Unclassified, Unlimited, Publicly available [2007] application/pdf http://hdl.handle.net/2060/20080039570 unknown Document ID: 20080039570 http://hdl.handle.net/2060/20080039570 Copyright, Distribution as joint owner in the copyright CASI Meteorology and Climatology 2007 ftnasantrs 2018-06-09T22:59:09Z The possible linkage of tropical cyclones (TC) to global warming is a hotly debated scientific topic, with immense societal impacts. Most of the debate has been focused on the issue of uncertainty in the use of non-research quality data for long-term trend analyses, especially with regard to TC intensity provided by TC forecasting centers. On the other hand, it is well known that TCs are associated with heavy rain during the processes of genesis and intensification, and that there are growing evidences that rainfall characteristics (not total rainfall) are most likely to be affected by global warming. Yet, satellite rainfall data have not been exploited in any recent studies of linkage between tropical cyclones (TC) and global warming. This is mostly due to the large uncertainties associated with detection of long-term trend in satellite rainfall estimates over the ocean. This problem, as we demonstrate in this paper, can be alleviated by examining rainfall distribution, rather than rainfall total. This paper is the first to use research-quality, satellite-derived rainfall from TRMM and GPCP over the tropical oceans to estimate shift in rainfall distribution during the TC season, and its relationships with TCs, and sea surface temperature (SST) in the two major ocean basins, the northern Atlantic and the northern Pacific for 1979-2005. From the rainfall distribution, we derive the TC contributions to rainfall in various extreme rainfall categories as a function to time. Our results show a definitive trend indicating that TCs are contributing increasingly to heavier rain events, i.e., intense TC's are more frequent in the last 27 years. The TC contribution to top 5% heavy rain has nearly doubled in the last two decades in the North Atlantic, and has increased by about 10% in the North Pacific. The different rate of increase in TC contribution to heavy rain may be related to the different rates of different rate of expansion of the warm pool (SST >2S0 C) area in the two oceans. Other/Unknown Material North Atlantic NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS) Pacific |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS) |
op_collection_id |
ftnasantrs |
language |
unknown |
topic |
Meteorology and Climatology |
spellingShingle |
Meteorology and Climatology Zhou, Y. P. Lau, K.-M. Wu, H.-T. Tropical Cyclones Feed More Heavy Rain in a Warmer Climate |
topic_facet |
Meteorology and Climatology |
description |
The possible linkage of tropical cyclones (TC) to global warming is a hotly debated scientific topic, with immense societal impacts. Most of the debate has been focused on the issue of uncertainty in the use of non-research quality data for long-term trend analyses, especially with regard to TC intensity provided by TC forecasting centers. On the other hand, it is well known that TCs are associated with heavy rain during the processes of genesis and intensification, and that there are growing evidences that rainfall characteristics (not total rainfall) are most likely to be affected by global warming. Yet, satellite rainfall data have not been exploited in any recent studies of linkage between tropical cyclones (TC) and global warming. This is mostly due to the large uncertainties associated with detection of long-term trend in satellite rainfall estimates over the ocean. This problem, as we demonstrate in this paper, can be alleviated by examining rainfall distribution, rather than rainfall total. This paper is the first to use research-quality, satellite-derived rainfall from TRMM and GPCP over the tropical oceans to estimate shift in rainfall distribution during the TC season, and its relationships with TCs, and sea surface temperature (SST) in the two major ocean basins, the northern Atlantic and the northern Pacific for 1979-2005. From the rainfall distribution, we derive the TC contributions to rainfall in various extreme rainfall categories as a function to time. Our results show a definitive trend indicating that TCs are contributing increasingly to heavier rain events, i.e., intense TC's are more frequent in the last 27 years. The TC contribution to top 5% heavy rain has nearly doubled in the last two decades in the North Atlantic, and has increased by about 10% in the North Pacific. The different rate of increase in TC contribution to heavy rain may be related to the different rates of different rate of expansion of the warm pool (SST >2S0 C) area in the two oceans. |
author |
Zhou, Y. P. Lau, K.-M. Wu, H.-T. |
author_facet |
Zhou, Y. P. Lau, K.-M. Wu, H.-T. |
author_sort |
Zhou, Y. P. |
title |
Tropical Cyclones Feed More Heavy Rain in a Warmer Climate |
title_short |
Tropical Cyclones Feed More Heavy Rain in a Warmer Climate |
title_full |
Tropical Cyclones Feed More Heavy Rain in a Warmer Climate |
title_fullStr |
Tropical Cyclones Feed More Heavy Rain in a Warmer Climate |
title_full_unstemmed |
Tropical Cyclones Feed More Heavy Rain in a Warmer Climate |
title_sort |
tropical cyclones feed more heavy rain in a warmer climate |
publishDate |
2007 |
url |
http://hdl.handle.net/2060/20080039570 |
op_coverage |
Unclassified, Unlimited, Publicly available |
geographic |
Pacific |
geographic_facet |
Pacific |
genre |
North Atlantic |
genre_facet |
North Atlantic |
op_source |
CASI |
op_relation |
Document ID: 20080039570 http://hdl.handle.net/2060/20080039570 |
op_rights |
Copyright, Distribution as joint owner in the copyright |
_version_ |
1766136093361569792 |